US interrogation tactics were torture: former State Department lawyer

[JURIST] Former US State Department (DOS) [official website] lawyer Vijay Padmanabhan [faculty profile] criticized the administration of former president George W. Bush for approving the use of extreme interrogation techniques against terrorism suspects, in an interview [AP report] with the Associated Press reported Friday. Padmanabhan, who now teaches at Cardozo School of Law in New York, served as the DOS's chief counsel on Guantanamo Bay and Iraq [JURIST news archive] detentions, and said that he believed the interrogation tactics used against some detainees constituted torture. He said the Bush administration was wrong to argue that the detainees were not protected by Geneva Convention [materials] rights, and that the tactics were an overreaction to the 9/11 attacks against the US.

About Paper Chase

Paper Chase is JURIST's real-time legal news service, powered by a team of 30 law student reporters and editors led by law professor Bernard Hibbitts at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. As an educational service, Paper Chase is dedicated to presenting important legal news and materials rapidly, objectively and intelligibly in an accessible format.